Build connections between generations with SAGE Table

Frequently asked questions

What does a SAGE Table look like?

A SAGE Table looks beautiful because it’s created with a diversity of smiling faces—older and younger—showing up to talk and share and learn from each other.

Each SAGE Table should have four main elements:

A smattering of generations

Food to share

Meaningful conversation

A plan for sustaining the intergenerational connections we make

A SAGE Table doesn’t have to be dinner—it can be a lunch or breakfast or even a snack.

You can have a SAGE Table anywhere—at your home, the lunchroom at your office, a local restaurant, a place of worship, a picnic table in a park or any place where you can relax and facilitate conversation between younger and older LGBT people and allies.

How can I participate?

Host a meal. Once you register to host, we’ll send you the SAGE Table Planning and Conversation Guide and connect you to other tools to help you plan.

If you’re not sure that you’re ready to host, consider co-hosting with a local organization or business—or join the SAGE Table Facebook group and ask if there’s a SAGE Table happening near you.

When is SAGE Table?

SAGE Tables happen all the time, but we encourage folks to grow their community by hosting during one or more of the following cycles:

May 23–30, 2019:Older Americans Month and Pride Season

August 28–September 4, 2019:Intergenerational Labor Day

November 7–14, 2019:Giving Thanks for LGBT Elders

If you’re looking to join a SAGE Table near you, check out our Facebook group—especially around these dates!

What’s expected of me as a SAGE Table host?

Register as a host, then check out our guides and tools. They will help make sense out of hosting.

Bring together people of different ages who are part of, or allied with, the LGBT community.

Offer guests some food and facilitate the conversation using the guide we’ll provide.

Commit to asking people to check in and share their contact information with each other so that connections can keep happening.

Take a photo of your event and, if everyone is comfortable, share it so that everyone can see our community of many generations.

Because SAGE Table is a friend-raiser—not a fund-raiser—you won’t ask your guests for money. Instead, as you close your event, you will ask them to follow up by meeting again with someone from a different generation whom they met at your event, hosting their own SAGE Table, or planning to participate in other opportunities we will provide to take action and make a difference.

Is SAGE Table a fund-raiser?

No. The goal of SAGE Table isn’t to raise money—it’s to build connections.

We’re not asking you to open your wallets for LGBT elders, we’re asking you to open your hearts. For some of us, that’s a harder thing to do, but it’s what our community needs.

What do we talk about at a SAGE Table?

We encourage SAGE Table hosts to moderate the event conversation (or invite someone else to do so) using the conversation prompts in the guide. We’ve learned over past years that using prompts has a dramatically positive effect on how people experience the event.

SAGE Table is really about listening and learning from each other in a relaxed, fun way.

Why is SAGE Table important?

Loneliness and social isolation threaten everyone as we age—but they’re more likely to be problems for LGBT older adults.

Older people who are LGBT are:

2x as likely to be single and live alone

4x less likely to have children to care for them

Older LGBT people have additional barriers that reinforce isolation:

2 in 5 feel disconnected from the younger LGBT community

9 in 10 expect healthcare providers to discriminate against them

Through SAGE Table, we can reach out—person by person, community by community—to connect with one another. Together, we can build our own, real-life social network to support our LGBT elders.

Need to know more?

Join our SAGE Table Facebook group to make friends and learn about intergenerational events in your community. You can post a question or check out upcoming webinars that can connect you to other hosts and SAGE staff.

SAGE Table stories

On November 8, 2018, in more than 150 locations across the U.S. and the globe, thousands of LGBT people and allies gathered as part of the intergenerational LGBT initiative SAGE Table. The event, which had a successful debut last year […]

The beauty of an intergenerational friendship is infinite. SAGE Table brings older and younger members of the LGBT community together to talk about our commonalities. We go through the same things, we have a shared history, and we have a […]

Hosting a SAGE Table affords you the opportunity to learn about LGBTQ history in a profound way: through the people who lived it. It also allows you to better understand your own role in creating our history and our future.

Have questions?

We’re a national advocacy and services organization that’s been looking out for LGBT elders since 1978. We build welcoming communities and keep our issues in the national conversation to ensure a fulfilling future for all LGBT people.